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Appearing in "Crescent City Memories"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Spider-Man Team-Up #5

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • Jaques St. Pierre (First appearance)
  • Meredith DeWolff (First appearance)

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

Races and Species:

Locations:

Items:

Synopsis for "Crescent City Memories"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Spider-Man Team-Up #5

Now

Ben Reilly has decided to go out and enjoy the nightlife in Manhattan, and goes to the N'Awling's bar.[Continuity 1] As he orders a club soda from the bar he meets a woman named Meredith DeWolff, who strikes up a conversation when she learns that Ben doesn't drink alcohol. He tells her that he got a VIP pass from his friend Mary Jane who insisted that he needed to get out more.[Continuity 2] As the couple begins to flirt, Ben finds out that Meredith also attracted the attention of a man named Remy LeBeau who, unknown to them, is the X-Man known as Gambit. However, Remy decides to leave the pair to get to know each other so he can reconnect with his friend Jaques St. Pierre who is at the bar. St. Pierre is a good friend of LeBeau and the pair got to know each other during Remy's time as a thief in New Orleans. Jacques insists that he is still on the straight and narrow, but Remy begins to get suspicious when St. Pierre is approached by two rough looking men looking for a table with some privacy. Remy is not the only one who finds these two men suspicious as the two men set off Ben Reilly's spider-sense. Getting a good look at one of the men, Ben recognizes him as a man named Creaux and wonders what he is doing out of jail. Seeing Creaux causes Ben's mind to think back to their last encounter...

Then

This was during the time that Ben Reilly was living on the road during a period he thought he was a clone of Peter Parker and was on a self-imposed exile.[Continuity 3] After his experience in Salt Lake City, Ben had decided to be alone and decided to travel to New Orleans.[Continuity 4] Walking among the revelers in the French Quarter, Ben stopped to rest his feet outside Ms. Nellie's Souvenir shop. Seeing Reilly outside her store, Ms. Nellie went out to make sure he wasn't a drunk passed out in front of her store. Learning that he is hungry, she offers to feed Ben if he cleans the garbage off the front stoop of her shop. Sitting down to a meal, Ben learned that Ms. Nellie had a son but he had died and decided not to press her for more details since they were strangers. What started off as a one-off dinner, Ben was invited to stay in the spare room and work in Ms. Nellie's shop. One day, while Ben was in the back room, Creaux came into the shop. Fearing for Reilly's safety, Nellie tells Ben to stay hidden.

During those days, Creaux was an officer of the New Orleans Police Department and a crooked one at that. He has come to collect protection money from Ms. Nelly, who tells him that business has been slow. As she pleads, she touches Creaux's arm, angering him enough to strike her. Seeing this sent Ben Reilly into a rage and he leaped out of his hiding place. In the ensuing struggle, Ben pushed the crooked detective into a display of snowglobes. The shattering glass slacked a line down Creaux's face, creating the scar that he now sports. Furious at being disfigured, Creaux then blew voodoo dust into Ben's face, rendering him completely immobile. Fortunately, Ms. Nellie prevented Creaux from shooting Ben until the integrity commission could send police officers to arrest Creaux to arrest him. As her father was a practitioner of voodoo, Ms. Nelly was able to create a mixture that restored Ben to normal. With outstanding warrants for his arrest, Ben decided not to stick around for the police to question him and left New Orleans quickly. He never knew what happened to Ms. Nellie, and the one time he tried to call her while on the road led to the discovery that her phone number had been disconnected.

Now

While recollecting this, Ben had slipped away from DeWolf so he could follow Creaux and his friend to find out what they are up to. In the main bar, Remy learns that Meredith's new friend followed after the two men to the back rooms. This worries Remy who goes around back to investigate himself.

As it turns out, Jaques St. Pierre has been courted by Tombstone to use his bar as a front to sell cocaine. When Jaques turns down Tombstone's offer, he has Creaux blow voodoo powder into St. Pierre's face, warning him that the powder will leave him paralyzed. By this point, Ben has slipped into the air conditioning shaft to change into his Spider-Man costume. There he overhears Creaux suggesting that they use the vents to expose the patrons to their highly addictive drugs to get them hooked on the substance with ease. Before they can do this, they are interrupted by Gambit who disarms the two thugs with kinetically charged playing cards. While Gambit focuses on Creaux, he is grabbed by Tombstone from behind, ordering Creaux to shoot the intruder, unafraid of getting shot because he himself is bulletproof. That's when Spider-Man leaps in, gumming up Creaux's gun with webbing and attacking Tombstone. Despite the fact he had the element of disguise, Spider-Man is struck by Tombstone with sufficient force to send throw the wall-crawler out into the crocodile pen that is in the middle of the bar. Tombstone and Creaux then make a break for the air conditioning unit intending to dose the entire crowd. Gambit follows after the pair, but he has trouble getting through the thick crowd in the bar. Gambit manages to tackle Creaux sending them falling back into the bar area. However, during the struggle, the bag of drugs is knocked free and is about to spill out over the crowd. Thankfully, Spider-Man has managed to get free from the crocodile pen and webs the bag of drugs shut before their contents can spill.

That's when Tombstone attacks the wall-crawler and is about to choke him to death when Meredith DeWolff, a police officer in the narcotics division draws her gun and orders the mobster to put Spider-Man down. However, this threat doesn't scare Tombstone who trades Spider-Man with officer DeWolff. At that moment, Gambit has knocked out Creaux and uses his mutant powers to pry Meredith from Tombstone's grasp. By then, Spider-Man has recovered from being choked out by Tombstone and lands a knockout punch. After the authorities take Tombstone and Creaux away, Spider-Man uses the skills he learned from Ms. Nellie to cure Joseph St. Pierre from the effects of Creaux's voodoo powder.

Appearing in "Puppets"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Spectacular Spider-Man #235

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

Races and Species:

Locations:

Items:

Synopsis for "Puppets"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Spectacular Spider-Man #235

Spider-Man happens upon a gang indoctrinating a young man into their group by killing some of their rivals. Sickened by this sight, the wall-crawler quickly diffuses the situation with his webbing. He then gives a lecture that life in a gang will lead to death if the youths allow themselves to become puppets to petty thugs. As he finishes his speech he notices a strange light streaking across the sky above the city and decides to investigate. The light suddenly swoops down and picks up the wall-crawler and carries him to a nearby rooftop. The light takes on the human form, but when Spider-Man tries to attack it, he passes through the being harmlessly. This entity knows the wall-crawler and pleads for Spider-Man's help. He explains that he has been enslaved by Jonas Harrow in order to commit crimes for his employers. Before he can explain any further, this mystery man suddenly shrieks in pain as his keepers reassert control. He tells Spider-Man to meet him the following night at State University before disappearing. Returning to his apartment, Ben Reilly calls Peter Parker to learn who this person is. Parker explains that it is one of his old foes, and sometime ally, Will O' the Wisp. Peter is at the Daily Bugle, where the bullpen is alive with activity as reporters go about their business. Jacob Conover shows Billy Walters, a new employee, around the office, while Joe Robertson goes over the latest photos of the new Green Goblin.[Continuity 5] Peter concludes his education on the Wisp, aka Jackson Arvad, by telling Ben that he has the poor luck of being manipulated or blackmailed into doing the bidding of others.[Continuity 6] After hearing this, Ben decides to do what he can to help Arvad, particularly since there is nothing he can do since his apartment was robbed.[Continuity 7]

Meanwhile, at the Rye New York headquarters of Roxxon Oil, a group of businessmen meets with Jonas Harrow for an update on the job they hired him for. Harrow assures them that he will soon be able to steal the technological information they seek so they can build a synthetic army. Ready to begin the next phase with their plan. With that in mind, he sends Will o' the Wisp to carry out the next phase of their plan. It's midnight at State University when Spider-Man arrives to meet with Will o' the Wisp. He catches Will as he is pulling data from one of the computers. He tells Arvad to stop committing crimes, but Jackson explains that he is being forced to do so thanks to Jonas Harrow's manipulations. That if he deviates from Harrow's orders, he will have his atoms dissipated across all creation. He then tells Spider-Man that his next target is the prison known as Iron Rock on the following evening. That's when Will o' the Wisp is inflicted with more pain and is forced to teleport away. As he does so, Spider-Man notices that the last thing to dematerialize is Harrow's implant. The next day, Peter Parker is in J. Jonah Jameson's office answering a call from Doctor Eric Schinner, and tells him that he and his wife will not be returning to Portland.[Continuity 8] He thanks Schwinner for giving him a job at Giard, but he realized that he can't run away from his life in New York.[Continuity 9] After he gets off the phone, Peter is suddenly wracked with spasms again.[Continuity 10] The spasms pass as quickly as they came, and while Peter wonders what is happening to him, J. Jonah Jameson returns to his office and is furious to see Peter sitting in his chair.

The following evening, Spider-Man arrives at Iron Rock located on the coast of the New Jersey Palisades. It is a maximum security facility where some of the most dangerous information in the country is contained. He slips past the security and confronts Will o' the Wisp and tells him what he learned about Will's implant, and theorizes that if Arvad becomes intangible again, the wall-crawler can reach through and pull the implant out. Although this could theoretically work, Will has no time and presses into the facility and enters the containment unit that he seeks. Looking inside the containment unit Will o' the Wisp is shocked to see what is contained within. Back at Roxxon, Jonas Harrow is informed that their operative has succeeded in infiltrating Iron Rock. With that, Harrow sends orders to Wisp to free the creature contained there. Moments later, Will o' the Wisp emerges from the facility screaming in pain. He tries to tell Spider-Man what he has done, that he was forced to do it. That's when Harrow activates the kill switch to destroy Will o' the Wisp. This causes Arvad to become intangible, and Spider-Man takes the chance and plucks the implant from Jackson's head. Although Will o' the Wisp is going to live, the danger is far from over as moments later Dragon Man comes smashing through the wall.

Appearing in "Free Will"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Spectacular Spider-Man #236

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

Races and Species:

Locations:

Items:

Synopsis for "Free Will"

Reprint of the 1st story from
Spectacular Spider-Man #236

After Peter Parker suddenly collapsed, his wife Mary Jane has him rushed to the hospital emergency room.[Continuity 11] As Peter is rushed into the emergency room, nurses ask Mary Jane if Peter has any pre-existing health conditions, however, she can't provide any answers as this was a sudden collapse. Doctors are frantically examining Peter's body, and discover that his heart rate is spiking all over the place and work as hard as they can to keep him stable. Out in the hallway, Mary Jane thinks about everything that has happened to them recently: Her pregnancy, Peter's retirement as Spider-Man and losing his spider-powers, and the recent discovery that he is a clone.[Continuity 12] She wonders if Peter is finally suffering from the degeneration that affects all of Jackal's clones eventually.

Meanwhile, Spider-Man has failed to stop Will o' the Wisp from freeing Dragon Man from Iron Rock. The Wisp was forced enslaved by Jonas Harrow and forced to free the android for Roxxon, who hoped to use the creature to make an army of synthetic soldiers. As Spider-Man tries to contain the creature, the wall-crawler is interrupted by an Iron Rock security forces come to try and contain the situation. Unfortunately, they only agitate Dragon Man further. The wall-crawler manages to usher the guards away and tries to calm down Dragon Man. This fails, thanks to one of the remaining guards who tries to shoot the creature in the back. This only angers the android creature more, but Spider-Man once again tries to calm the creature again. While back at the Roxxon facility, Jonas Harrow wonders what is taking Will o' the Wisp so long to return with Dragon Man. That's when one of his technicians inform him that not only has Wisp been freed from the implant that made him their slave, but Spider-Man is interfering with their plans. Back at Iron Rock, Will o' the Wisp wakes up and puts a quick end to the battle by using his powers to burn out the device he planted on Dragon Man to put him under Roxxon control, ending his threat. At the Roxxon facility, Jonas Harrow tries to explain his failure to the businessmen who hired him. As the security forces at Iron Rock try to regain control of the situation, they are unaware that someone has managed to sneak in and intends to take advantage of this situation.[Continuity 13]

Meanwhile, Will o' the Wisp thanks Spider-Man for freeing him from Harrow's control. The two then create a scheme to turn this around the mad scientist. At the Roxxon facility, the monitors come back on, and Harrow and his men are led to believe that Spider-Man has been defeated. While back at the hospital, Mary Jane tires to reach Ben Reilly to tell him what happened, but can't get ahold of him. That's when one of the doctors tells her that things aren't looking good and her husband's condition continues to deteriorate. By this time, Spider-Man and Will o' the Wisp use Dragon Man to sneak into the Roxxon facility and ambush them. There, they trash all of Harrow's equipment. However, this causes Dragon Man to go on another rampage. While the wall-crawler is calming Dragon Man down, Will o' the Wisp corners Jonas Harrow and is about to kill him. However, Spider-Man succeeds in calming Dragon Man and convinces Jackson that killing Harrow won't see justice done. Convinced to spare Harrow, Will o' the Wisp thanks Spider-Man for his help and leaves. In all the confusion, Dragon Man manages to escape as well. Spider-Man decides to let the android go, thinking that everyone deserves a second chance.

Notes

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Flashback[]

Chronology[]

See Also

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References


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